🔴 Athens Scoop Business #3: Kemp's $200M bet on GA-316

Hey Athens.

I'm Andrew, the owner of Athens Scoop. Over 7,000+ people read our weekly newsletter about life in this town. About ~800 of you have told us you own a business here, and this is an email just for you to keep you connected to the entrepreneurial side of town.

Everything here is free. I want to help Athens businesses grow, and I think the best way to do that is to get us all in the same room and talking to each other. The businesses that thrive here are the ones that are connected.

Here's edition three:

Athens Scoop Business Meetup: You're Invited

I'm putting together the first Athens Scoop Business Lunch for local business owners. No agenda, no pitch decks, no nametag energy. Just good food and good conversation with people who get what it's like to run something in this town.

I'm choosing the restaurant right now. If you want a seat, vote below and I'll send details to everyone who does.

Spots will be limited. More details coming soon to everyone who votes.

Kemp Brought 275 People to UGA. Here's What He Said About Athens.

Governor Brian Kemp spoke at the Athens Area Chamber of Commerce's annual Pancakes & Policy Breakfast last Monday, March 10, at UGA's Tate Student Center. It was the largest crowd the event has ever drawn, with 275 attendees filling the auditorium.

Kemp, who is from Athens and is in his final year as governor, used the breakfast to lay out what he's done and what's still coming. The highlight for anyone who drives between Athens and Atlanta: $200 million to continue upgrading GA-316 from Gwinnett County to Athens, converting it from a four-lane highway into a full access-controlled expressway with interchanges and overpasses.

His exact line: "It shouldn't take you a full afternoon to get from Athens to Atlanta or vice versa."

That $200 million is part of a bigger $2 billion+ infrastructure push in Kemp's final budget, which also includes $1.8 billion for I-75 express lanes in Henry County and $250 million in grants for local road projects statewide. The GA-316 work has been unfolding for years, with several interchange projects already completed in Barrow County and Gwinnett, but this funding keeps the timeline moving.

Why this matters for Athens businesses: A faster, safer 316 makes Athens more accessible to the 6 million+ people in metro Atlanta. That's more day-trippers, more event attendees, more customers who might have otherwise stayed closer to home. It also makes it easier to recruit talent that lives in Gwinnett or Barrow but would consider commuting to Athens. The concert at Sanford Stadium on April 25 (Luke Bryan, Jason Aldean, 60,000+ expected) is a good preview of what happens when getting to Athens becomes easier: hotels book up, restaurants fill, and money flows through local businesses.

The Pancakes & Policy crowd also heard Kemp talk about Georgia's broader economic performance over his seven years, though specifics from the Athens remarks weren't detailed in published reports beyond the infrastructure headline.

Source: Georgia Trend, Mar. 10, 2026

Your Business Tax Renewal Is Due April 1. Here's What to Know.

If you run a business in Athens-Clarke County, your 2026 Business Occupation Tax renewal is due by Wednesday, April 1. That's 15 days from today. Certificates submitted after April 1 get hit with a 10% penalty, so don't sit on this one.

Here's the deal: about 5,000 businesses are registered with ACC, and renewal info was mailed out in December. If you got that envelope and it's still sitting on your desk, now's the time. If you can't find it, you can pull up the application form electronically at accgov.com/finance.

Quick clarifications that trip people up: these are technically "business occupation tax certificates," not business licenses. ACC's Finance Department can't actually issue a license to operate your business. They just collect the tax and issue the certificate. If you're a new business (including home-based), you need to fill out an application before you start operating, at any time during the year.

Questions? Call the ACC Finance Department's Business Tax/Revenue Section at 706-613-3050.

One caveat: the website isn't the most intuitive thing you'll ever use. If you get stuck navigating the form, calling that number is faster than trying to figure it out on your own.

Source: ACC Government Newsflash, 2026

That's Edition 3. If you know something I should cover, whether it's a business opening, closing, hiring, expanding, or doing something worth paying attention to, reply to this email. I read all of them. If you're interested in sponsoring this newsletter or the main Athens Scoop one, same thing, just reply.

We also built a free business directory at athenscoop.com/directory for Athens business owners. Your listing gets seen by our 7,000+ readers and gives your business an SEO boost with 5-10 backlinks to our site. No cost to join. Let us know at the bottom of that website or here and we'll get you set up.

Talk soon.